Thanksgiving…Bacon Style!

Turkey with a bacon crust

Everything goes great with bacon! These days, they are even pairing it with ice cream, but how about turkey? One of our PSE followers, Tomas Gonzales, submitted his Thanksgiving turkey pics and recipe. We couldn’t resist! Here are the steps to Thanksgiving bacon style!

Ingredients:

15-20 lb Turkey – cleaned, gutted, and thawed

1 tsp thyme

1 tsp rosemary

1/4 tsp pepper

1/2 stick of butter at room temperature

Pound of bacon

Stuffing

Two apples cut in wedges

Two oranges cut in wedges

Twine

1/2 cup pineapple juice

Aluminum foil

Aluminum roasting pan

Make sure the turkey is gutted, cleaned and thawed. Dry the turkey so the herbs will stick to the skin. Combine the thyme, rosemary, pepper and butter and rub the mixture on the turkey including in the areas under the breast skin. No additional salt because the bacon will provide the salt. Preheat the over to 500 degrees.

Weaving the bacon

Weave the bacon in a basketweave configuration on aluminum foil. It’s done on the foil to make it easier to flip it onto the turkey. You can find videos on youtube.com to show you how to do this; just search on “bacon basket”.

Stuffed turkey

Cut the apples and oranges into wedges and place a few inside the cavity of the bird along with your stuffing. Tie the legs of the bird up with the twine.

Turkey right before putting it in the oven

Place the bird and the remaining slices of apples and oranges into the pan. Flip the bacon onto the bird and cover the remaining areas with bacon.

The secret sauce – pineapple juice

Pour the pineapple juice over the turkey making sure to coat the bacon on top of the turkey. The turkey is now ready for the oven. Put the turkey in the over for 15 minutes at 500 degrees.

Take the turkey out of the oven after it has browned for 25 minutes. Cover the turkey with aluminum foil and lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees. Place the bird back inside the oven and cook it according to the weight of the turkey.

Baste the turkey

Every 30 minutes, baste the turkey in its own juices. The last 20 minutes of cooking time, remove the foil and let the turkey brown. When the bird is finished cooking, take it out of the oven, cover it with foil and let it sit for 20 minutes before serving.